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Friday, June 29, 2012

I spent last Friday afternoon at the Original Sewing and Quilt Expo held at the Convention Center in Raleigh. I didn't sign up for any lectures or classes - nothing was particularly appealing during the only time I could go.

I was somewhat surprised at how light the crowd was. Perhaps because many people were in class or perhaps because it was a weekday. (The show went Thursday through Saturday.)

Everyone I did see was clearly enjoying themselves. One thing I found amusing was the parking garage attendants. They looked completely bored until this group of ladies appeared to make their goodbyes in the parking garage. There was much laughing, hugging, shrieking and more hugging. The parking lot attendants didn't know what to do with themselves and were shaking their heads in disbelief. I guess that much hugging doesn't normally go on in a convention center parking garage!

I did enjoy a couple of hours visiting the quilts on display and the vendors. These house blocks are entries into a contest and when the contest is over, they are auctioned on ebay.

I love all of them - the house with quilts all inside.... the house from Up!. Isn't that quilter sitting there in her house just wonderful?

I listened to two small lectures on the quilt floor. One discussed an easy way to construct HST using a triangle ruler. Much of the time I end up using charm packs to make my HST but easily piecing HST from yardage sounded quite appealing. Essentially, you lay two strips on top of each other and sew BOTH side seams. I believe this is called the tube method. Then you use a triangle ruler and the resulting cut gives you perfectly trimmed triangles. I did buy the ruler - how could I not with the promise of easy HST (grin). I'll try it out and report back.

Given the fun I am having with paper piecing, I also bought an add a quarter ruler, foundation paper and the batiks that I intend to make a NY Beauty quilt with.

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Introducing Potato Chips - these block were so addicting that you can make just one!

I used Sweetwater's Lucy's Crab Shack and had a grand time pairing up the charms for each of the blocks. The sashing is the white print with numbers from the line.

I did an all over FMQ design. The quilt finished roughly 36 inches square which is about the largest I am comfortable quilting on my home machine. I will bind it in blue fabric but won't get to that for a bit.

Another fun Schnibble pattern - Leap Year - which was a gift from Carrie. Thanks for another fun month in AYOS - can't wait to see the rest of the parade!

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Knitting this shawl has turned out to be a fun adventure. I love that the most you are dealing with on the needle at any time is 50 stitches. If you mess up, easy to just rip and restart. How do I know this? In order to put the 4th fan 'block' on (center, top), I had to pick up 50 stitches. I tried it 4 times before I got it right.

I'll be quite the pro at picking up stitches when this is all done. Here is a picture after the 5th fan. I've numbered the order I made each fan block to give a view of the construction.

It took almost a full 50g ball to make the 5 fan blocks. I like the fact that with this project is I should be able to clearly estimate whether or not I will have enough yarn.

Now what does any quilter who likes to knit really need? Why a quilted knitting bag of course! I used some scraps from Fig Tree California Girl fabric and did a bit of FMQ practice. It is lined with a shade of Bella blue - not sure what the color is called. (Based loosely on this tutorial.)

Monday, June 25, 2012

SewCalGal has done it again lining up a fantastic guest for this month's FMQ challenge. Cindy Needham's tutorial was filled with really helpful information.

As directed, I started with a squiggly line with loops (technical term there!), and then filled in each of the areas with some FMQ. I tried feathers, echo quilting, free motion lines and pebble quilting.

These photos aren't the best - hard to get enough contrast so I marked each thing in the photo below.

Saturday, June 16, 2012

I found these wonderful New York Beauty block on Ulas Quiltpage and decided to make block 8 for my block in Jane's Red/White/Blue blog hop.

I've never done paper piecing before so I watched some videos on your tubes to get the basic concepts and then I dove in! So far, one error made that required stitches to be ripped out. Loving it so far!

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

The same applies to the blocks from this month's AYOS. Ms Carrie graciously gifted the AYOS regulars with a new pattern called Leap Year.

I thought I'd make a small Schnibble 3 blocks by 3 blocks. So I made a block

And then I made a few more

And now i've decided to keep going - looks like I will make it a 4 x 4 blocks and essentially use up 2 charm packs and then perhaps even cracking open a third. I'm using Sweetwater's Lucy's Crab Shack. Very, very fun!

Monday, June 11, 2012

Friday night's Sound of Music sing-a-long was a lot of fun. It was a beautiful night to sit outside, picnic and sing along! Some people came in costume. These are some of the best ones. Looking at the photo from the left, you've a marionette. In the bottom row (2nd from left) is a needle pulling thread and then on the right, you've got two guys in yellow (ray of golden sun). The guy in the full yellow body suit was quite funny. There were also many a nun with quite an abundance of facial hair!

One more - from Favorite things - see the snowflake on eyelashes?

Finally, a bit more sewing time that last weekend. I cut into my Pure layer cake..... let the fun begin!

Friday, June 8, 2012

First, as part of SewCalGal's 2012 Golden Quilter's Award, I won a gift certificate to the Fat Quarter Shop in a random draw for the PR angels. I had so much fun choosing fabric including some yardage from Sweetwater's Lucy's Crab Shack.

At the very bottom is Charlie Brown's Christmas - I also bought a panel.(a small portioned of it pictured below.)

Darlene at SewCalGal does so much for the quilting community. My thanks to her and Fat Quarter Shop for my winnings.

My second fun thing - no sewing for me tonight. Huh? My daughter and I are off to the movies! There is an outdoor showing of the Sound of Music - it is a sing-a-long. We did this last year and had a blast.

Monday, June 4, 2012

Found time this weekend to make a block. Loving this HST quilt a long from In Color Order.

Things have been quite busy with my girls this week which meant for lots of memories but little quilting time. This past weekend was dance recital weekend which meant rehearsals several evenings last week. My girls did fabulous - I was very proud of them - and both did a phenomenal job. Best of all, they had a blast being part of the show. (There are 5 shows in all.)

Then this week, they are both 'graduating' from 8th grade. (The schools call it a ceremony but in our house we call it a graduation.) They are in two different schools so Wednesday is the big day for DD#1 and Friday the big day for DD#2. My son (the oldest) is away for the summer and is missing all the celebration. Everything is being captured on video though.